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IBBY Announces New Sponsor of Hans Christian Andersen Awards

IBBY is delighted to announce that Nami Island Inc. of South Korea has generously agreed to sponsor the Hans Christian Andersen Awards for the next ten years!

Nami Island is an extraordinary island, owned by the Minn family and lying in the Bukhangang River, to which Korean families come for day trips, and where they encounter the wonderful world of books. The annual NAMBOOK festival that attracts children’s books, performers, and artists from around the world; the Centre for Environmental Studies; the Artists’ Centre and residential cottages where artisans and artists can come to work and live with nature; the UNICEF pavilion; the outdoor sculpture garden; and most especially, the numerous little nature libraries scattered throughout the island, make this one of the most extraordinary places in the world for children, as well as adults, to encounter books.

Led by the brilliant South Korean designer, illustrator, writer and current president of KBBY, Woo-hyon Kang, it is hard to imagine a more perfect sponsor for the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Awards. IBBY is deeply grateful for this exciting new sponsorship.

At this moment, IBBY would also like to express its gratitude for the sixteen-year long sponsorship of the awards by the Nissan Motor Company of Tokyo, which, will culminate at the 31st IBBY Congress in Copenhagen, Denmark in September this year, where Her Majesty Queen Margrethe II of Denmark is expected to present the 2008 awards. Nissan’s funding has allowed the Hans Christian Andersen Award to maintain its unquestioned status. We thank the Nissan Motor Company with all our hearts for their most warmly appreciated support.

The Award’s international jury and the incontestable quality of its laureates assure that the Hans Christian Andersen Awards are still the most prestigious awards in the world of children’s books. IBBY’s international network of 72 countries ensures that the laureates’ books are known and read throughout the world. As Katherine Paterson once said after winning the Award in 1998: “The Hans Christian Andersen Award gave me the world.”

Now, we can move towards the next ten years, secure in the confidence that we have an exciting and vibrant new sponsor. Within the IBBY family, Woo-Hyon Kang and Nami Island are famous for their generosity, energy, enthusiasm and for the magic that they bring to everything they undertake. We believe that with their help the Hans Christian Andersen Awards will flourish and that we can bring the prize and its laureates to the world in even more effective and dynamic ways.

Patsy Aldana, IBBY President

Bologna 2008, March 31, 2008